Jesper Hoffmeyer’s site
Main area of interest: Biosemiotics
By Jesper Hoffmeyer
The study of living systems from a semiotic (sign theoretic) perspective.
Biosemiotics is not one among other biological subdisciplines but constitutes a distinct theoretical frame for the study of biology. According to biosemiotics most processes in animate nature at whatever level, from the single cell to the ecosystem, should be analyzed and conceptualized as sign-processes (see below*). This does not imply any denial of the anchoring of such processes in well-established physical and chemical lawfulness. But it is claimed that life-processes are part of and are organized in obedience to a semiotic dynamic. Biosemiotics, then, is concerned with the sign-aspects of the processes of life (not with the sign-character of the theoretical structure of life-sciences).
In the biosemiotic conception the life sphere is permeated by sign processes (semiosis) and signification. Whatever an organism senses also means something to it, food, escape, sexual reproduction etc., and all organisms are born into a semiosphere, i.e. a world of meaning and communication: sounds, odours, movements, colours, electric fields, waves of any kind, chemical signals, touch etc. The semiosphere poses constraints or boundary conditions to the Umwelts of populations since these are forced to occupy specific semiotic niches i.e. they will have to master a set of signs of visual, acoustic, olfactory, tactile and chemical origin in order to survive in the semiosphere. And it is entirely possible that the semiotic demands to populations are often a decisive challenge to success. Probably more than anything else organic evolution has to do with the development of ever more sophisticated semiotic means for surviving in the semiosphere.
Signprocesses (or semiosis) are processes whereby something come to signify something else to somebody (and 'somebody' here may be taken in the broadest sense possible, as any system possessing an evolved capacity for becoming alerted by a sign.
Main area of interest: Biosemiotics
By Jesper Hoffmeyer
The study of living systems from a semiotic (sign theoretic) perspective.
Biosemiotics is not one among other biological subdisciplines but constitutes a distinct theoretical frame for the study of biology. According to biosemiotics most processes in animate nature at whatever level, from the single cell to the ecosystem, should be analyzed and conceptualized as sign-processes (see below*). This does not imply any denial of the anchoring of such processes in well-established physical and chemical lawfulness. But it is claimed that life-processes are part of and are organized in obedience to a semiotic dynamic. Biosemiotics, then, is concerned with the sign-aspects of the processes of life (not with the sign-character of the theoretical structure of life-sciences).
In the biosemiotic conception the life sphere is permeated by sign processes (semiosis) and signification. Whatever an organism senses also means something to it, food, escape, sexual reproduction etc., and all organisms are born into a semiosphere, i.e. a world of meaning and communication: sounds, odours, movements, colours, electric fields, waves of any kind, chemical signals, touch etc. The semiosphere poses constraints or boundary conditions to the Umwelts of populations since these are forced to occupy specific semiotic niches i.e. they will have to master a set of signs of visual, acoustic, olfactory, tactile and chemical origin in order to survive in the semiosphere. And it is entirely possible that the semiotic demands to populations are often a decisive challenge to success. Probably more than anything else organic evolution has to do with the development of ever more sophisticated semiotic means for surviving in the semiosphere.
Signprocesses (or semiosis) are processes whereby something come to signify something else to somebody (and 'somebody' here may be taken in the broadest sense possible, as any system possessing an evolved capacity for becoming alerted by a sign.
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